Fortified
by HedgeNinja
Summary: A bored Hawke is a mischievous Hawke. Just a random piece of fluff ish . M!Hawke/Anders, probably K  rated T for innuendo.


_A/N: Written at speed to cheer up a sad anon on k'meme. Tried for fluff, think I managed closer to saucy._

* * *

><p>-o-o-<p>

When Anders stepped into the blissful warmth of the front hall of the estate from the icy blasts currently sweeping through Kirkwall the scene that greeted him prompted thoughts in the approximate order of "spring cleaning?" followed by "packing?" followed by "theft by furniture magpies?" followed by "huh?" Every piece of furniture that wasn't the bookshelves fastened to the walls had vanished, and those showed long gaps on various shelves where pieces of the collection had also disappeared. Yet the main door had been closed, a fire still warmed the room from its expected location in the fireplace…Anders' staff was in his hand, the first tendrils of blue fire starting to trickle through his mind as Justice stirred slightly as he moved cautiously into the room. Quiet voices came from further into the mansion; suddenly resolving into laughter, Elka's excited barking, and a gleeful cry of "Enchantment!"

-o-o-

When he entered the main sitting room the missing furniture technically became merely 'relocated' but the question of "huh?" still applied. The furniture, most of the floor area of this room and possibly the dining room beyond as Anders' eyes glanced around had vanished under sweeps of fabric. Sheets, blankets, (was that the tapestry from the upstairs landing?) lay draped across items of wildly varying heights creating some enormous, bizarre indoor patchwork tent. And seemingly holding it all in place were books, in piles precariously around the whole structure weighting down corners and edges, the occasional small piece of furniture anchoring especially vital spots. Cushions filled in occasional gaps; from underneath came playful growls as figures bobbed against the ceiling inside before Sandal wriggled out through one side clutching a soon to be the worse for wear cushion in a tug of war with the dog. In the room's far corner near the fireplace Leandra looked up from a book with her usual quiet smile, seated in the one chair that seemed to be exempt from becoming part of the surrounding chaos. "Apparently today became an 'indoor day'" she commented in response to Anders' raised eyebrow. "The boys got bored. He's upstairs; you should change out of those things, you look half frozen."

-o-o-

Almost shyly Anders nodded as he headed for the stairs. The change in his and Hawke's relationship to 'living together' was still new, frequently he still found himself wondering at the ease with which Leandra had welcomed him into the family, as Hawke's partner rather than a stray charity case. She seemed to think he was a good man; he wondered when he'd grown so talented at lying. The nagging itch that was Justice compelled him to check the study, for a wonder the desk was still there, although the chair wasn't, and the pile of papers representing Anders' latest work on the manifesto…Anders shook his head. A tossed cushion greeted him as he entered the bedroom.

"You're late" Hawke said, flicking a glance towards the heavy drapes outside of which darkness had long since fallen. "You can help with the finishing touches though"; indicating the only slightly smaller offspring of the construction downstairs that sprawled from in front of the fireplace across three quarters of the floor.

"Are you planning to fill the, whatever it is with nomads or something?" Anders inquired.

"It's a blanket fort" Hawke explained, in tones of stating the obvious. "We used to make them as kids, but only when the weather was bad enough that we were allowed to stay inside for the day. Kept the three of us in one room out of everyone else's way."

"You do realise that you already have a bed with blankets hanging off it?"

"That's cheating; much more fun to make it yourself. You never made these at the Circle?"

-o-o-

Anders shook his head "We had the books, but getting all the bits together in one place? There were better options if you wanted somewhere for ah, quick encounters."

Hawke rolled his eyes "Mages; always about the sex. And here I thought you were simply coming back after slogging around frozen Darktown since dawn making house calls, just long enough to pick up those extra supplies you stashed here before pulling an all-nighter at the clinic in, did I mention, still frozen Darktown?"

Anders blinked "How…?" It was probably an accurate, if unappetizing description of the evening's intended activities.

"Natural brilliance" Hawke replied, shrugging not even slightly modestly. "The same brilliance that tells me you probably haven't eaten today. However since those supplies are currently engaged in important work and the rules say the fort has to be allowed to stay up for one day, looks like you're stuck here long enough to get dry and something to eat. I'm not answering to Mother for letting you go in that state."

Anders glanced at the fort, not wanting to notice too well that positioned near the fire as it was it was probably very warm, and cozy, and making him far too aware of how exhausted he was…_Right; blankets, supplies; focus_.

"And then can…?"

"_Yes_; afterwards I'll help you cart everything down there. We could always build it again you know; you've got plenty of tables-"

"Which get used."

"The spare cot then. It's not like it should get used for anything else; even the floor's more comfortable than that thing for sleeping on. And if I'm getting dragged out into that weather again and taking down all my hard work early then you owe me help with another matter."

"And that would be?"

"Apparently recent rounds of baking have been mysteriously vanishing; I said we'd look into it as always, but it feels like a mystery that will never be solved wouldn't you say?"

-o-o-

While he was speaking Hawke had collected a sheet-sized towel from somewhere off the top of the nomad fort to drape over Anders hands while starting to tug the heavy mess of wet feathers and wool that was Anders' coat off his shoulders. Maybe a good idea since the heat of the room after outside was starting to make Anders slightly light-headed. Or maybe it was just that his brain was finally starting to thaw out; enough to notice that throughout the entire conversation Hawke had been padding around wearing a robe nearly short enough to only count as a shirt, silk in the deep red of the Amell family crest. It was pulled _just_ closed enough to not quite answer the question about whether Hawke was wearing anything else at all; but Anders was fairly sure he knew the answer. Just as he knew he couldn't hide the growing heat in his look as he met his lover's eyes. Hawke's own held a mixture of exasperated amusement at Anders' belated realization, and all the smugness of a cat in cream at the desired reaction.

"The manifesto…?" The words came out of his mouth, muffled as his shirt was tugged over his head, but the part of Anders' mind that occasionally glowed blue and actually cared about the answer was being shoved growling into a very small box.

"Ah." Hawke put his hands on his hips with a look of mock concentration, and not at all deliberately in the process sliding the edges of that robe tantalizing inches sideways towards freedom. "Manifesto. Big, heavy papery thing tied up with string?"

"Ye-es…"

"That was just perfect for a central weight and that Sandal might have magically stuck to a footstool because he got confused about the rules when we were making the downstairs fort?"

"Magically. Stuck."

"Alright I'm kidding. About the stuck part. Probably." Hawke sighed "I'm not going to stop you doing, whatever, well not tonight anyway, but at least take a little bit of backup with you, like say, food and sleep? Think of it as an oasis. Or whatever an oasis is when it's warm. Speaking of warm, the wine should be hot by now and the chocolate in the cookies is probably starting to melt. If there were any cookies; and…" Hawke purred "you know how messy that gets" before pulling him into a kiss to send the room's temperature several steps beyond 'who needs pants?'

"Cheater" Anders eventually managed.

The cat-in-cream grin was there again. "Whatever it takes" as Hawke turned to crawl under the tent's low entrance and the question of just what was under that robe was answered to everyone's satisfaction.

-o-o-

Later there would be several theories put forward as to exactly what when had led to the sudden collapse of the blanket fort; the matter of the missing cookies however was tragically filed as 'unsolved'.


End file.
